Jason Scott McIntyre, 33 has been charged with drug possession and drug use for carrying about 5 grams of hashish in Kuta, Bali.

The possession charge carries a sentence of 10 years jail and drug use a maximum of four years.

From the Australian newspaper:

Arresting officer Cokorda Alit said he found Mr McIntyre stumbling down the street talking gibberish.

“He said he got the drugs for free from a woman,” Alit told the court.

“He admitted that he was using it and his urine tested positive.”

McIntyre is from Humpty Doo, a small town in Australia’s Northern Territory approximately
Mr McIntyre is from Western Australia but has been living most recently in Humpty Doo, in the Northern Territory, about 40 km from Darwin.

Last night we had dinner at Toba Resto in Canggu Bali. The taxi driver didn’t have a clue where the place was, even after speaking to the owner three times on my mobile. Finally he just dropped us off and the owner kindly picked us up. It’s probably a 15-20 minute drive from Kuta as long as you don’t get lost and is on the road to Tanah Lot.

I had spahgetti marinara and the seafood tasted very fresh. Entertainment was provided by a batak music group from Lake Toba, North Sumatra. The service was very friendly and much better than most of the restaurants I have been to so far in Kuta and Legian. The food is a mixture of Batak, Indonesian and western food.

People having their bank accounts hijacked from ATMs is not new, but there seems to be frequent reports of it happening in Bali and other parts of Indonesia. This post from the Bali Pod forum got my attention, even though it was from 2005.

Most western banks have returned the money to customer’s accounts, but Indonesian banks may not be so quick to return the money.

Here is at least one report from an Australian newspaper, dated March 2009:

Darragh Brady, 25, said he went to withdraw money but found his account empty, with about $1800 taken in seven instalments.

“The cards were copied or skimmed in some way,” he said.

Mr Brady’s friend Stephen Matthews, 24, got a call from his bank, ANZ, asking him about strange transactions – but $2900 had been taken out.

They said they wanted to warn other travellers.

“We know a lot of people travel from Darwin to Bali,” he said.

“The bank’s saying it is insured but obviously we have to prove it was fraud.”

The two men had returned from Bali in January and the money was taken out last month.

I have been traveling in South East Asia and China for the past two years and touch wood, I am yet to have a problem. I also heard the scam is wide spread in the Philippines.

You can see how criminals can obtain your pin number and card details here.

Indonesia has reported its first cases of the A-H1N1 virus and is stepping up controls at its ports, especially with visitors from Australia.

Anyone displaying flu like symptoms at the airport will be placed in quarantine until they are cleared of the virus.

Australia has reported three deaths from the virus and around 2,873 cases of the flu.

It might seem like harmless fun getting a henna or temporary or henna tattoo while you are on holiday in Bali, but I have read a few stories now of people having skin problems when they get back home from their holiday, especially with children.

The West online newspaper reports the story of Mrs Kneale and her twin 11-year-old daughters Chloe and Holly who got henna tattoos in Bali.

After landing, Chloe was in agony and wound up at Princess Margaret Hospital facing the prospect of plastic surgery after the henna blistered and burnt her skin red raw.

Mrs Kneale said her daughter’s trauma was akin to someone pouring acid on her skin.

She decided to speak out to warn other parents against allowing their children to get henna tattoos in Bali.

“It was bubbling and . . . it would pop, ooze a yellow substance, and then as soon as it popped it would start blistering again,” she said. “It was like a third-degree burn, she was in agony.”

Cannon Cribb who is just five years old from Queensland had a dragon painted on his arm in Bali. He had similar trouble and his parent’s fear the tattoo will leave a permanent scar.

You can sometimes spend hours searching the internet and forums for information on living and working in Indonesia, but nothing beats having a chat with fellow expats over a beer or two.

Expat forums like Balipod seem to have more people living outside of Bali hoping to move there eventually. Let’s face it, if you are living in Bali, you don’t want to spend much time on a computer writing about living in Bali.

Anyway I was chatting with an Aussie bar owner and he said his KITAS (working visa) costs 8 million rupiah (around US$800) a year and another $100 or so in tax each month. If you are running a small business like a guesthouse, bar or English school, it’s definitely not cheap, especially if you are just getting started.

I have started a real estate section here on this site. Agents and owners can list there properties for sale/rent here for free.

Click here to see the property section.

I just wish I could afford some of the beautiful places for sale here in Bali.

I am in Kuta right now, finding a decent place with free wifi has taken me a little while. Possibly because I really haven’t felt like using my computer too much since I arrived in Bali.

I have created a page with a few places with free wifi that I have been to so far.

Gloria Jeans in Kuta Square seems to be the best so far. The lounge upstairs is very comfortable for doing some blogging. The coffee shop is Australian owned and managed and even has “Aussie meat pies”.

Bali’s governor Made Pastika is giving his support for part of the movie “Eat, Pray, Love” to be filmed in Bali. Julia Roberts will play the leading role.

The novel by Elizabeth Gilbert tells the story of a woman’s “spiritual journey” as she sets off for a year of travel to recover from a divorce and failed relationship. She travels to Italy to eat, India to pray and Bali to find love.

The film is set to be a blockbuster and should be a great promotion for tourism to Bali. In Bali she rents a house in Ubud and spends most of her time there.

I was reading in the Bali Post that the construction of a nightclub has started on the site of the former Sari nightclub that was destroyed in the Bali bombings in 2002.

An Australian group had been planning to buy the land and build a Peace Park on the site. The Australian government was even planning on giving them the money to purchase the land. A total of 202 people died in the bombings, including 88 Australians.

A memorial was build on the site of the former Paddy’s Pub, listing the names of the people who died in the blast.

The land owner, a Jakarta resident, leased the land to person who already runs several nightclubs and restaurants in the area. I suppose it is about money, but the Australian government was ready to spend a couple of million dollars on the land. Perhaps the financial crisis changed their plans.

Other than the beach, there aren’t any public parks in the area, so it would have been a nice shady, place to relax and many people would argue another nightclub in the area is the last thing Kuta needs. A nightclub would provide a few more jobs for the locals, but it’s not like it will have a huge economic impact.